


some blossoms have the scent of melancholia

by ConstantlyConfusedAlien



Category: Strange the Dreamer Series - Laini Taylor
Genre: First Kiss, Flowers, Flowers as wounds, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Meet the Family, Meeting the Parents, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, kind of getting together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-12
Updated: 2020-07-12
Packaged: 2021-03-05 02:22:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25226749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ConstantlyConfusedAlien/pseuds/ConstantlyConfusedAlien
Summary: “The flowers were a double edged sword – the knowledge that his soulmate was alive and Ruza wasn’t alone in the world where shadows were heavy and smothering, but knowing something was terribly wrong because they couldn’t be brushed off as tumbles down a hill or the nick of a branch from climbing a tree anymore.”
Relationships: Thyon Nero/Ruza
Comments: 12
Kudos: 25





	some blossoms have the scent of melancholia

**Author's Note:**

> Some feelings and few people  
> Have the power to make us whole.  
> Others are like weapons –  
> Lethal guests that shatter our soul.  
> Have you ever been so broken;  
> That acid tears burn your hopes?  
> Have you ever had the doubt;  
> Chase the horizon or live like a ghost?
> 
> When flowers bloom from a broken heart;  
> From the labyrinths within is core.  
> What essence do they have?  
> How far their stem can go?
> 
> If you can hear me, my darling  
> I can tell you what I know.
> 
> Some blossoms have the scent of melancholia  
> Unable to reach the surface (afraid to grow).  
> Others are bathed in new beginnings;  
> Eager to reach, the light of the sun.
> 
> \- Fertile Hearts, Clairel Estevez

Ruza’s skin had been dappled and carpeted in the bright colours of flowers for little under ten years of his life. Ever since he’d gone to change after a tiring day of running through the fields on the outskirts of the city in the sun with his friends and had spotted the two purple nightshade flowers on his shoulder – appearing weeks after his eighth birthday that traditionally marked their arrival – he had taken to checking his skin each day to observe exactly what pain his soulmate had been suffering through.

Each eighth birthday was cherished in Weep, as the union and magic of soulmates themselves were cherished, even with the looming shadow of the seraphim above their heads. It was the one day where people could ignore it easier. Grand gatherings were thrown, usually organised in places out of the shadow, and people worked together to bring as many flowers together as they had once done before the gods came. Suheyla, who’s hair had not had as many grey hairs and a younger spring to her step, had told him that the little books that had survived the anchors told of birthdays where there would have been seas of petals and colours, and of everyone rejoicing for the bees it would bring to their gardens.

But people didn’t have gardens anymore, there was nothing for the bees to come to, and the only flowers came from the outskirts of the city. Besides, no colours were particularly bright under the shadow.

Everyone learnt about the different types of flowers and their meanings, even before their eighth birthday, and though some chose not to anymore, some, like Ruza, had chosen to prick themselves with a pin in the same place each morning so he could find his soulmate. He knew due to the miniature size of the wound, that the corresponding flower on his soulmate would be too, but some part of him hoped that what ever pain they went through, the small blossom at their inner elbow would ensure they didn’t feel alone.

Especially once the flowers started appearing more and stayed for longer.

Dogwoods, chrysanthemums, and lilies were brushed along his ribs as if seeds had been pressed into the layers of his skin as hands wrapped around him. Buds of small yellow bougainvillea and forget-me-nots were stark against the deep brown skin of his wrists, the implications of them alone scared him with haunting nightmares of the flowers one day wilting and falling from his skin in rotting clumps.

The flowers were a double edged sword – the knowledge that his soulmate was alive and Ruza wasn’t alone in the world where shadows were heavy and smothering, but knowing something was terribly wrong because they couldn’t be brushed off as tumbles down a hill or the nick of a branch from climbing a tree anymore.

His hope in finding them slowly grew desperate over the years, despite his Mum and Dad’s assurances that he would find them someday, the fantasies he’d had as a child of being teenagers and growing up together dwindling into ash. He wanted to find them, to help protect them against what was happening to them, to make them happy. But he didn’t know where they were, he didn’t even know if they were in Weep. 

When Eril-fane had told them of the plans to venture across the desert to finally get rid of the shell of the seraphim, Ruza had been ecstatic. Some part of him had known that other people had to be out there, but he had never even considered that he would be one of the few to rediscover vast cities and sprawling lands. He learnt the language and rode across a desert with hawks circling above and dodging threaves, the fire of determination within his heart burning brighter – he could find his soulmate.

He had met many people; engineers, philosophers, mathematicians, builders, and artists, on his journey – some of which he sincerely hoped weren’t his soulmate – but he couldn’t find them at first glance, and couldn’t think of any way he could check without deeply invading someone’s privacy and possibly insulting them.

_“Hello, did you regularly get beaten for several years, especially on your back – sorry to ask, it’s just that I’ve been covered in flowers for most of my childhood.”_

His Mum would skin him alive.

It wasn’t Lazlo, and part of him was relieved despite his eagerness to find his soulmate because Lazlo was a good friend. Besides, his eyes didn’t hold any lingering touch of the darkness that would be required to birth flowers from lines on their wrists, despite how deep he had ventured into the darkness of that library of his where the only guide was candle and luck.

The slight attraction he’d first taken towards Thyon Nero’s appearance was honestly annoying, and each time he had caught his gaze lingering on his stupid face he wanted to punch both himself and Nero in the nose. Though he was glad that each time the idiot opened his mouth and spoke there was a drastic drop in any kind of attraction he felt – he was one that Ruza hoped wasn’t his soulmate too. He didn’t want to be with a _gulik_ who looked down on other people and expected everyone to cater to his every whim.

As his journey continued, less of his time was spent searching people for any scars that matched the flowers he could remember having, for he had discovered nothing and his hope of them being near faded away. Instead his time was spent learning the language of Zosma from Lazlo and teaching him and Calixte Unseen, as well as finding spare time to throw rocks at threaves deep within the sand with his friends.

But when he managed to get a moment alone his first thought still was to check for new flowers, always unwrapping the bands around his wrists and finding colourful sorrows and pain in blossoms of jasmine and lily and bluebell and narcissus. In the privacy of when he bathed and scrubbed the sweat of the heat and distance away with sand and pulverised negau root, he checked the rest of his body for more. He hadn’t had any other flowers appear after the delegation had left Zosma, and his relief when they had all finally faded and curled back into the deeper layers of his skin had been immense. They only grew on his wrists now.

But he was no fool to think that the danger from oneself and their mind was less than that of danger caused by another.

After the berating heat of the desert, the relief of reaching the cooler temperatures of Weep rippled through the delegation with the visible release of muscles and tension. He spent much of his first day back with his family, who, after him being away so long, smothered and pestered him for details of what had happened and the other cities. The topic of his soul mate was quickly brushed over without any more questions when he had minutely shaken his head in response to his mothers questioning look. She had smiled sadly and kissed him on the forehead, and that had been that.

Telling them about the various people that Eril-fane had recruited to get the seraphim shell out of the sky had been incredibly amusing, laughing at the ridiculousness of each them, though the look in his Mum’s eyes when he told them about Nero had put him on edge. Ruza had made sure to emphasise how much of an asshole he was. Keelan, his younger brother by three years, had gotten particularly excited when Ruza had told him about Soulzeren and Ozwin Eoh’s silk sleigh invention and how they could use it to fly.

He’d barely been able to stop him from bursting into the guardhouse to ask them questions. Dad pointing out that none of them could likely speak the same language well enough to have a lengthy conversation about it had thankfully gotten through to him. Though the conversation ended with Ruza finding himself tasked with the obligation of teaching Keelan their language, the attempts he had made to copy Ruza had been enough of an indication of what the lessons would be like. Completely ridiculous.

When the night had turned dark and he and Mum were alone in the kitchen, she had gently taken his arms, as if he were the one with the wounds on his wrist, and unwrapped the bands Ruza wore. The flowers were same as they had been that morning when he had checked, apple blossoms and bluebell and lavender and peony, and the tenderness that she used to brush her fingers across the surface was the same as it had been before he’d set out across the desert.

Not a word was spoken as she pressed a kiss to each, and then pulled him into her arms, the hug warm and tight, as if she wished to hug both Ruza and his soulmate who was in far too much pain. He watched over her shoulder as Dad walked into the kitchen and didn’t hesitate to join them, pressing a kiss to Ruza’s forehead and adding his own arms to the tangle of limbs.

Both his parents had been there for him when he had discovered the first flowers across his wrists and held him as he cried in confusion and fear, not knowing what was happening and desperately asking why. They had been there for him when he had grown frustrated by people’s pity when they saw the flowers and had taken the bands and hidden them. They had the same burning desire to meet and protect them as he did.

Several days after getting home, the flowers had gone limp and dull, as if a syringe had pulled their purpose to live from their spidery veins. When he had taken a moment to check, hands made of vines had clasped around his throat, squeezing tight with the same hopelessness as last time it had happened. Ruza had been terrified, worried that his soul mate was slowly dying before he got the chance to meet them. The only sleep he had been allowed was filled with nightmares of rapidly wilting flowers, turning brown and dark with rot, changing to dirt as it fell to the ground around him and flew into his lungs. Waking had become the hardest part of his day for weeks – ripping away the covers with the grip of panic and seeing even more of the same dull and drooped flowers. To see it return had only hurt more.

_What was happening to them?_

But no one could answer that, and the dark of his mind and the corners of his room had never revealed anything.

There had been a sense of peace and hope in Weep when the delegation had returned with a mathematician, artist, climber, explosionist, inventors, and an alchemist in tow. Peoples dreams of their sky returning had finally seemed close to becoming reality, and the reminder of what had happened to their city would be finally be gone. But then the citadel hadn’t been empty, and there was the chaos of a blue girl speared through the sternum on one of the fences, and the resurrected mesarthium creatures flying above abandoned houses, and a desperate traveller of other worlds coming to seek revenge for the cruelty done to a sister already long dead.

And amongst it all, he had seen Thyon Nero’s arms.

He would gladly admit he didn’t know much, if anything beside that it involved metals and making gold, about alchemy, but he did know that making lines on one’s skin was not part of it.

When he had seen his Mum and Dad after everything had passed, and he had spent an hour curled up with them on the couch that overflowed with pillows trying to make the raging sea in his head calm, he hadn’t been able to bring himself to tell them anything. He hadn’t told them that the person they had been comforting from afar through the warmth of kisses on flowers and hugs could be the same as the one who had looked down on others and be cruel. 

But he was also the man that was changing, and was still, beneath it all, in pain.

There wasn’t much time before they were planned to leave, going through worlds and meeting new people with the simplicity of flying through a cut in each, and some part of him wanted Thyon to meet his Mum and Dad before then. That’s if he was right about his thoughts and it was Thyon. He cursed the pounding of his hopeful hearts, and the sweating of his palms, because he could utterly humiliate himself by asking, and yet the only thing he could think of was how much more grounded and real Thyon had seemed after everything.

“Can I talk to you?”

He had been waiting a little away from the room he knew Thyon had been staying in instead of his laboratory, cursing his cowardice as he couldn’t bring himself to knock on the door. He’d fought an army of ghosts in the amphitheatre, travelled across a desert riddled with threaves, seen metal melt under the touch of both Lazlo and an angry god – but he couldn’t knock on a bloody door.

Thyon looked puzzled and weary. “Okay,” he said slowly, stepping out fully and closing the door behind him. “What about?”

Ruza swallowed past the lump in his throat that strived to strangle him and his words silent, and asked, “What do you know about soulmates?”

If possible, Thyon looked more confused. “Not at a lot, why?”

He took a deep breath, held it until it burned, and let it out in a rush of words, “I think you’re my soulmate.”

Thyon frowned, opening, and closing his mouth several times, but all that came out was a single hoarse word. “What?”

“I saw your arms,” Ruza said quietly into the darkness of the night that was spreading further into the hall as the sun set further towards the horizon. He was distinctly aware of Thyon going deathly still, not all that dissimilar to the tenseness that he had held himself with when first joining the delegation. “There’s been flowers on my own arms there for several years in the exact same spot, and even if I did believe your excuse about it being alchemy-”

“If you think you can mock me-”

“I’m not.” But the walls that had slowly crumbled over the past several days had scrambled to shakily build themselves up again.

“What do you expect from this then – if you are right?” Thyon sneered, but the malice that Ruza had become familiar with in the desert was missing. This was more like that of a wounded lion, snarling to keep away the danger and stop it from biting at its wounds.

“Nothing.”

Thyon visibly wavered, and Ruza pushed on. “I _expect_ nothing from this, but I can _hope_ for what I want to come from this, if I am right and you are my soulmate. No flowers on someone’s skin can force people to be or do anything, it is an opportunity that people can take and work towards, there are no simple options or solutions to this. This is me taking that chance.”

He desperately searched Thyon’s face. Taking in the frown, now in guarded confusion and not anger, the blue eyes that were scanning his face in turn, the dream-like and aristocratic features – he was shut out and unable to clearly tell what Thyon was thinking, but at least he wasn’t angry anymore. 

“Why?” Thyon asked, words entwined with golden threads of bewilderment and uncertainty, eyes searching Ruza’s face for flickers of an answer, guarded still with the safety of a thin veil. “I have been horrible and done terrible things, I didn’t even learn your language before joining the delegation and I certainly didn’t make an attempt during any of the time crossing the desert.”

Ruza dared a step closer, and then another when Thyon’s eyes didn’t turn sharp. “You have changed and are still. We wouldn’t be having this conversation if you hadn’t – I know that I deserve better than the person you were but believing people can’t and don’t change doesn’t get anyone anywhere. We all have to change – what I have been told about the gods and the godspawn, and what I have said about them myself, I have to change too.”

The wall had crumbled again, and Thyon’s eyes were cautious and tired. “What could you possibly hope to come from this?”

Ruza took another step closer, gentling taking Thyon’s hands in his, the same shiver running across his skin as when Ruza had first grabbed his hand to stop him from walking away. There was a shake in Thyon’s breath, his eyes flicking between his hands and Ruza’s eyes.

“I hope that I could act upon certain things – regardless of whether we are soulmates or not, I would want to,” Ruza said, voice soft in the space between them.

Thyon’s eyes lingered on his face, taking in each minute detail. The deep brown skin, lines from squinting in the sun, the black of his thick eyelashes, and the brown of his eyes turned to molten honey with the remaining glow of the setting sun. And then his eyes were drawn back to their joined hands and the bands around his wrists, where the edge of a bright blue petal had grown past the boundaries of the cloth.

Thyon moved closer, and Ruza’s hearts stuttered in his chest, the flame of hope burning brighter in his chest.

“How are you going to check?” Thyon’s voice was no more than the brush of a breath against Ruza’s lips, deep but uncertain, and his eyes mirrored the same.

Letting go of one of Thyon’s hands, Ruza reached into his pocket and brought out the same pin he had religiously used each morning to prick his inner elbow. Thyon shifted, unsure, as Ruza brought it to the palm of his own hand.

“We don’t have to check,” Ruza said, and Thyon’s eyes shot up. “If you’d rather not know – we don’t have to.”

But Thyon shook his head, “Check.”

Ruza bit back a grin at the slight order in his tone, the mildly exasperated but amused look in Thyon’s eyes making it clear he could tell. He blindly pressed the pin into his palm, the familiar sting of the breaking of skin reminding him of all those hopeful mornings when he had done the same.

They both visibly steeled themselves before looking down at their joined hands. With a slight twist of Thyon’s hand, a flower was revealed mid bloom, both slumping against each other in stunned joy with their foreheads resting against each other as they watched.

A royal blue iris slowly unfurled upon Thyon’s golden skin like the opening of a book, the yellow and freckled centre a calling of hope and possibilities. Ruza brushed his thumb over the burst of colour and he marvelled at the brush of a soft petal against his skin, as if an actual flower had come from Thyon’s flesh.

Thyon had a stunned look on his face, and Ruza wondered if some part of him had expected them not to be soulmates.

“So,” Ruza said, voice filled with barely restrained joy as he let the word drag out, and because he couldn’t resist the urge, he lifted his eyebrows suggestively with what was most likely a weirdly hopeful look on his face.

Thyon let out a soft and breathless laugh, eyes slipping closed as his lips curved into a soft smile that instantly had Ruza’s hearts soaring with both affection and the urge to kiss the stupidly beautiful look off his face.

Before he himself could make the first move to do so, Thyon had already tilted his face towards his, their noses brushing against each other. Ruza pushed forwards until their lips touched and both let themselves delight in the wonder that coursed through their veins and spirit.

_-_-_

“My mum will love you; I promise.”

“I still think this is a terrible idea, the worst one you’ve had so far, and from what I can tell, you have a lot of those.”

“Oh, come on, my idea to ask you about being my soulmate wasn’t so bad was it?”

Thyon sighed, visibly fighting back the urge to roll his eyes. “Well, maybe not that one, but that doesn’t mean this won’t end dreadfully.”

Ruza grinned and squeezed Thyon’s hand from where it was held in his, taking in the slightly stunned look that rose in Thyon’s eyes and spread across his face every time he remembered or was reminded of it. It was as if nobody had held his hand before. If so, that problem would be quickly fixed, because Ruza didn’t plan on ever letting go.

Walking down a street that would have been bustling with people had it not been abandoned was surreal to Ruza. He could almost see the people walking about, children darting around everyone’s heels, and the smell of food that wafted out from people’s kitchens on the breeze that always made him so hungry. Seeing it quiet left him with the feeling of being in the wrong place or an alternate world.

Taking Thyon Nero to meet his family for dinner was also surreal but wasn’t wrong like seeing an empty street was. There was something deeply warm and comforting about leading him to his childhood home, even though some part of him was nervous about what Thyon might think. It certainly wasn’t a palace made of pink marble.

“You’ve said it yourself that I’m not even a real person – which I still don’t understand – and I haven’t exactly proven to be good at talking to people. Why do you want me to meet your family?” Thyon said, slightly incredulous and confused.

“I don’t really think my brother counts as a person, with all seriousness,” Ruza said, squinting into the distant night as if lost to the trance of a memory. “The lungs on him when he was seven and he wanted to play outside but hadn’t finished his homework, merciful seraphim – my ears are still ringing.”

Thyon despite himself, choked out a laugh, though looked annoyed with himself afterwards for giving in. Ruza just grinned in triumph.

“I want you to meet my family because they have always supported me in everything I do, including travelling across a desert no matter how much they loathed the idea of me not being here, and they’ll support me in this without a doubt. And, my mum wants to meet you. Dad too.”

At Thyon’s slightly sceptical look he amended, “Maybe not you _specifically_ , but they have wanted to meet my soulmate for years. They both helped me through it when I first understood what that amount of flowers could possibly mean, even more so when the first ones appeared on my arms – they both tried to comfort you, as well as they could not knowing who or where you were.”

Thyon had gone stiff and deathly quiet with an air of guilt and unease, as he did every time Ruza hinted at what caused the flowers to be so abundant. Ruza wasn’t used to something being ignored in a conversation like this, when both knew but one refused to talk about it properly. Though, if it was himself, he wouldn’t want to talk about it much either.

“Fine, but I expect the right to say, ‘I told you so’ when this ends terribly,” Thyon said, and Ruza followed the change in subject. That was a conversation for another day.

“Then I get the same when this goes wonderfully.”

“You are far too optimistic.”

“And you are far too pessimistic, some would call that balance, eh?” Ruza grinned, knocking their shoulders together. Thyon stumbled slightly but let out a laugh that faded into a sigh as they neared the only house on the street with light coming from the windows – Ruza’s home.

Warmth filled his chest as they made their way closer to the door and the sound of his family’s conversation in their mother tongue drifted into his ears, and he could only hope that one day Thyon would learn to speak it, if only so he could hear the way his voice shaped the sounds and made them his own and to see how his mouth would make them.

Turning to look at Thyon, he had the absurd thought of how they would have looked to people walking by if the city hadn’t been abandoned in panic. No more than two people preparing to enter the chaos that was usually involved with a family dinner. Perhaps a few would note the nerves and burning joy of something beginning between them, but none would have known of the blue godspawn they had met, of the worlds they would soon visit, of the arrogance and pride that had once turned one to something unreachable and otherworldly. They would have been just ordinary people to them.

Ruza sent a reassuring smile to Thyon, who stiffly smiled in turn, and opened the door. 

The cool of the night vanished from their skin as the warmth from the fire settled in their bones and tired muscles, and a synchrony of voices seemed to beckon them further into the house. Ruza, despite his reassuring words to Thyon and having heard them from his parents themselves, was nervous, rubbing the back of Thyon’s hand with his thumb. It seemed to comfort both of them, for Thyon took a deep breath, letting it go, and with it the tense energy that had been building in his shoulders.

Drawing closer to the source of their voices, which Ruza knew to be the kitchen, he saw Thyon taking in the soft yellow and blue walls, the various photos strewn about that depicted several embarrassing memories he hoped Thyon wouldn’t ask about later, and everything that made it Ruza’s home. He fought the ridiculous urge to puff out his chest as an appreciative and approving look filled Thyon’s eyes.

Taking in the sight of the large kitchen and the happy people in it, they both stopped at the entrance and let their presence be ignored, Ruza breathing in the sense of home and mouth-watering smell of a home cooked meal. Mum was teasing Keelan as she went about preparing the last touches of the food, and from the disgruntled look on his face as he set the table, he wasn’t happy about her chosen target being how much he had missed his partner in their leaving of Amezrou. Dad was leaning against the counter as he periodically darted forwards to steal small bits of food when Mum wasn’t looking, face triumphant with each newly acquired treasure.

He was the first to see them lingering in the door, piece of chicken briefly pausing in its path to his mouth as he took in the sight of both them and their joined hands. Quickly piecing it together with realisation growing in his eyes, he shoved the food in his mouth and wiped his hand on his pants, shifting closer to stand next to Mum.

“Ondrea, I believe our guest has arrived,” Dad said, his signature dimpled smile filled with warmth as calculating eyes scanned Thyon, and Mum turned to face them with a smile. Ruza saw the flicker of panic in Thyon’s eyes as he stiffened slightly, both at the assessment and difference in language, and he quickly turned to mutter in Thyon’s ear.

“They know some of your language too, my brother more than my parents – enough for me to probably not need to translate a lot of things.” Thyon shot him a grateful look, though Ruza could spot flecks of shame there too.

Clearing his throat, stubbornly ignoring his lingering nerves and giving Thyon’s hand another squeeze to reassure the both of them, he said, “Mum, Dad, Keelan – This is Thyon.” 

Keelan looked at Thyon with curiosity from where he stood next to the table in the way that he had when Ruza had told him about Soulzeren and Ozwin’s silk sleigh. Ruza only hoped he didn’t spend the entire meal pestering Thyon for information.

A deeply amused grin from Mum as she walked closer was his only warning before she asked, “The same one you spent ten minutes complaining about for being a ‘golden idiot’?”

Ruza glared at her as his face flushed, but she only gave a smile that he knew to mean she would undoubtedly spend the rest of the night embarrassing him.

“You did what?” Thyon’s voice was incredulous, though when Ruza looked he was relieved to see his mouth twitch into half a smile as he tried to hold back his amusement.

“In my defence you were infuriating, and the whole golden thing is valid,” Ruza sniffed, and Thyon huffed. “But that’s not why I wanted you to meet him – Thyon is my soulmate.”

Mum froze in front of them, dark brown eyes flicking between them rapidly with hands that twitched at her side as if going to reach out before stopping. Her eyes sought out his, desperate with their fierce need for confirmation, and Ruza nodded with a small, sad smile. She had cried and raged for the child that was tied to his soul throughout the years, and the same protective urge that had been burning inside Ruza was within her too.

She looked into Thyon’s eyes, who had grown uneasy beside him the longer the silence had stretched on, as if waiting for a rejection that Ruza knew would never come, searching for the pain she had seen in flowers. Smiling, her arms moved from her side she stepped closer to Thyon, pulling him into a gentle embrace, one hand at the back of his neck and the other resting on his back.

Thyon had frozen, and only after several moments had passed, he slipped his hand free of Ruza’s and returned her hold with movements that were clearly unfamiliar to him. Turmoil flickered across his face, longing and insecurity surfacing the rolling waters, and Thyon hesitantly let his chin rest on Mum’s shoulder.

Mum had bitten at the corner of her lip and squeezed her eyes closed with each hesitant movement in sorrow, and when she had opened them again, she met Ruza’s with a fierce determination to replace the pain and hurt that had been dealt to Thyon with her kindness.

“It’s a pleasure to finally meet you,” Mum said, her voice gentle and accent thicker with her emotion, ending the hug to brush hair out of Thyon’s face and behind his ear. Thyon watched her with bewilderment and surprise, and Ruza’s chest ached with the force of it caving in as he took in how deprived he had been of positive touch.

“It’s nice to meet you too,” Thyon managed to say.

Keelan watched from next to Dad with a sad frown. He too knew of the flowers that had adorned Ruza’s body, with how hard it would have been to hide them all, and had mourned with them when he had gotten old enough to be told and understand. Dad wore an expression of welcome kindness, smiling softly when Thyon’s eyes had cautiously met his.

Mum stepped away, Dad taking her place as he gently pulled Thyon into a hug.

Thyon looked even more unsure and conflicted as he did when Mum had hugged him, though he was quicker to return the gesture. Ruza glanced at Mum and saw the same grim understanding reach her eyes, lifting a hand to gently rest it on Thyon’s shoulder when he saw the shine of tears rise at the corners of his eyes. Gently smiling when their eyes met, he saw the raw insecurity and longing that came as remnants of a life with too many flowers and few too hugs.

"I am glad my son found you after all these years and know that we will _always_ be here for you.”

Thyon’s eyes slipped closed for a second as if to brace against a surge of tears, and when Dad stepped back and released him from the hug, he moved to lean gently against Ruza’s side. Ruza lifted a hand to rest against the small of Thyon’s back, and he shifted even closer as he blinked back the tears that had gathered. Ruza was all too happy to give the support he needed.

Keelan grinned widely and with the look in his eye that warned Ruza of his intentions to tease, he said, “All I can really say is good luck, because you’re going to need it being stuck with Ruza.”

“Hey!” Ruza cried with indignation as a laugh left a startled Thyon, and Ruza turned to gasp with mock hurt.

“What, it’s true,” Keelan huffed with crossed arms, though he looked pleased with himself for lifting the atmosphere of the room from the dark gloom it had been steadily drifting into.

As Ruza watched his parents smile at Thyon with affection and the same fiery protectiveness they had when looking at him and his brother, and as he saw the gentle and utterly human look on Thyon’s face – Ruza knew, without a doubt, that he would be the one to earn ‘I told you so’ rights by the end of the night.

**Author's Note:**

> Eventually got around to writing this for camp nano.


End file.
